Eurekalert

With Army funding, scientists invented a way to make compostable plastics break down within a few weeks with just heat and water. This advance will potentially solve waste management challenges at forward operating bases and offer additional technological advances for American Soldiers.

On May 1, 2019, researchers observed a record-setting flare from the star Proxima Centauri--a burst of energy roughly 100 times more powerful than any similar event seen from Earth's sun.

Praying mantises are bizarre insects, yet many aspects of their biology remain unknown. Meanwhile, scientists from the Ruhr-University and the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology discovered that females of a South American species protrude a Y-shaped organ on their backs to release pheromones and attract males. Found in none of the over 2,500 species of praying mantises worldwide, the behaviour is reported for the first time in the peer-reviewed scientific Journal of Orthoptera Research.

Piperlongumine, a chemical compound found in the Indian Long Pepper plant, is known to kill cancerous cells in many tumor types. Now an international team including researchers from Penn has illuminated one way in which the piperlongumine works in animal models -- and has confirmed its strong activity against glioblastoma.

A new type of biopsy needle - which vibrates ultrasonically - greatly increases the amount of tissue obtained for pathologists to analyse. Currently, pathologists have to choose between a thick needle that provides a large sample, but causes pain, or a thin needle that is less painful, but gives lower quality samples. The ultrasonic needle solves this by providing large samples with thin needles, which could increase the effectiveness of medical procedures like cancer testing.

Scientists have found fragments of titanium blasting out of a famous supernova. This discovery, made with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, could be a major step in pinpointing exactly how some giant stars explode.

Substantial cuts in global greenhouse gas emissions could be achieved by raising water levels in agricultural peatlands, according to a new study in the journal Nature. A team of researchers led by the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology estimates halving drainage depths in these areas could cut emissions by around 500 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) a year, which equates to 1 per cent of all global greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activities.

Astronomers using data from NASA and the ESA (European Space Agency) telescopes have released a new all-sky map of the outermost region of our galaxy. Known as the galactic halo, this area lies outside the swirling spiral arms that form the Milky Way's recognizable central disk and is sparsely populated with stars. Though the halo may appear mostly empty, it is also predicted to contain a massive reservoir of dark matter.

A study that appeared today on Current Biology sheds new light on the continental migrations which shaped the genetic background of all present Europeans. The research generates new ancient DNA evidence and direct dating from a fragmentary fossil mandible belonging to an individual who lived ~17,000 years ago in northeastern Italy (Riparo Tagliente, Verona).

Scientists at Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley have designed an enzyme-activated compostable plastic that could diminish microplastics pollution. Household tap water or soil composts break the hybrid plastic material down to reusable small molecules, called monomers, in just a few days or weeks.

A new study by a team including researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and UC Berkeley reports that the social cost of methane - a greenhouse gas that is 30 times as potent as carbon dioxide in its ability to trap heat - varies by as much as an order of magnitude between industrialized and developing regions of the world.

Researchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have developed bistable inflatable structures inspired by origami.

Atherosclerosis -- hardening of the arteries -- is now involved in the majority of deaths worldwide, and advances in our understanding of the biology of the disease are changing traditional views and opening up new avenues for treatment.

The developmental hierarchy of the hypothalamus, which contains an astounding diversity of neurons that regulate endocrine, autonomic and behavioral functions, has not been well understood. Prof. WU Qingfeng's group from the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences conducted a study focusing on the origin of this neuronal diversity.

Wildfire smoke can trigger a host of respiratory and cardiovascular symptoms, ranging from runny nose and cough to a potentially life-threatening heart attack or stroke. A new study suggests that the dangers posed by wildfire smoke may also extend to the largest organ in the human body, and our first line of defense against outside threat: the skin.

What The Study Did: Researchers looked at whether short-term exposure to air pollution from a 2018 California wildfire was associated with changes in the number of clinic visits for eczema or itch and medications prescribed for eczema.

Scientists have provided the first evidence to show that eradicating rats from tropical islands effects not just the biodiversity on the islands, but also the fragile coral seas that surround them.

The disastrous consequences of climate "tipping points" could be averted if global warming was reversed quickly enough, new research suggests.

An international study coordinated by researchers from IRD and CIRAD reveals the composition of the tropical forests of Central Africa and their vulnerability to the increased pressure from climate change and human activity expected in the coming decades. Thanks to an exceptional dataset - an inventory of over 6 million trees across five countries - the researchers have produced the first continuous maps of the floristic and functional composition of these forests, allowing them to identify the most vulnerable areas.

Mice master complex thinking with a remarkable capacity for abstraction.